Author Archives: Michael

AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Sebastien de Castell Talks Play of Shadows

Hello and welcome to this Track of Words Author Interview, where I’m delighted to welcome back Sebastien de Castell to talk about his new fantasy novel Play of Shadows, which is out now from Jo Fletcher Books! Set in the same world as his Greatcoats series, this kicks off a brand new arc – and you definitely don’t need to have read the other books already, as I can testify myself (more on this later). I had a blast reading Play of Shadows, and I’d recommend it to any fantasy reader whether you’re a fan of the Greatcoats or, like me, new to this world. So read on to find out more about what to expect from Play of Shadows, its cast of characters, and the power of theatre in a fantasy world!

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Behind The Scene: Exclusive Author Commentary On The Last Phi Hunter by Salinee Goldenberg

I’m back with another Behind the Scene post here on Track of Words, where I hope you’ll join me in welcoming author Salinee Goldenberg, whose debut novel The Last Phi Hunter is coming out via Angry Robot on the 9th of April 2024! As always with these BTS posts, Salinee has kindly picked out an excerpt from her novel, and written an accompanying commentary, which this time focuses on the cinematic nature of The Last Phi Hunter. Salinee has chosen an excerpt from a couple of chapters into the book, so read on to find out more about this “mythic dark fantasy”, and in particular its central character pairing!

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Behind The Scene: Exclusive Author Commentary on Toxxic by Jane Hennigan

Hello and welcome to this Behind the Scene post here on Track of Words – I’m joined today by Jane Hennigan, with an excerpt from her new science fiction novel Toxxic (out now via Angry Robot) alongside an exclusive commentary on the subject of sequels and narrators. The follow-up to 2023’s Moths – “a thrilling dystopia, in turns heart-breaking and heart-pounding”, Toxxic “extends the world and the story of Moths, exploring the nature of gender roles and feminism through warm characters in difficult circumstances.” It sounds fantastic, and Jane’s commentary offers a fascinating insight into the thought that goes into a book long before an author actually starts writing – really interesting stuff whether you’re a reader, writer or both!

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW: Jeff Noon Talks Gogmagog

Hello and welcome to Track of Words, where today I’m delighted to present an Author Interview with Jeff Noon, co-author (alongside Steve Beard) of Gogmagog, the first in a new fantasy duology from Angry Robot. Subtitled The First Chronicle of Ludwich, and featuring one of my favourite fantasy covers in a long time (from the incredible Ian McQue), Gogmagog is a bonkers but brilliant weird fantasy novel. I’ll leave it to Jeff to describe the book, but I recently read it myself and can confirm that it’s excellent, and I jumped at the chance to chat to Jeff for this interview.

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10 Years of Track of Words In Numbers

At the start of a new year I always take some time to look back at the previous 12 months of Track of Words in numbers, and this year is no different (I’ve already published my 2023 in Numbers post), except that I’m also marking the anniversary of 10 years running Track of Words! I published my first post (this one, if you want to check it out) on the 27th January 2014, if you can believe it. So with that milestone now passed, and especially as I’m drawing a bit of a line in the sand now after which I’m going to be slowing down on the site (see my Track of Words in 2024 post), I thought it would be fun to do a separate numbers post looking back over a decade of Track of Words.

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Behind The Scene: Exclusive Author Commentary on Simul by Andrew Caldecott

Hello and welcome to this Behind the Scene post, in which I’m delighted to present an excerpt from Simul by Andrew Caldecott, accompanied by an exclusive commentary by Andrew himself. Out now from Jo Fletcher Books, Simul is the second volume of the Momenticon duology, following on from 2023’s Momenticon, which has been described as “a perplexing and brilliant story full of literary and artistic rabbit holes and quirky characters.” The idea behind my Behind the Scene series is to ask authors to talk a bit about a scene or a chapter from their book and give an insight into their thought processes as they wrote it. Here Andrew has more than fulfilled that brief, with a fascinating commentary exploring the concept and purpose of Simul’s opening chapter.

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The Unmaking Of June Farrow – Adrienne Young (Fabienne Schwizer Guest Review)

Hello and welcome to this Track of Words guest review, where today my good friend and fellow reviewer Fabienne Schwizer is here to talk about The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young – out now from Quercus. An “atmospheric mystery” exploring themes of family, guilt, time travel and murder, this sounds great! Over to Fab to tell us more…

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The Classic Celtic Spread: How I Use Tarot Cards As a Tool In My Writing – Maud Woolf Guest Post

Hello and welcome to this Track of Words guest post, where I’m delighted to be joined by Maud Wood – author of Thirteen Ways to Kill Lulabelle Rock, which is out today from Angry Robot! It sounds like an absolutely fascinating novel, but something else that sounds fascinating is Maud’s approach to crafting stories. In this guest post Maud takes us through her use of tarot cards as a writing tool, something I’d never considered before…but which I think makes a lot of sense! Whether you’re a writer yourself or simply interested in what goes into the work of writing a novel, this is a really interesting article.

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Track of Words in 2024

I’ve been running Track of Words for 10 years now (well, technically my 10 year anniversary is at the end of January, but who’s counting?!), and over that period I’ve constantly adjusted how much time and energy I’ve put into the site. In recent years I’ve cut down quite heavily, but over the course of the last few months I’ve come to an incontrovertible conclusion – I need to slow right down. I’m tired, basically. I need to step back a bit from what’s coming perilously close to feeling like a job, rather than a hobby, and I think 10 years marks a good time to draw a line under things. I’m not stopping entirely, but now’s the right time to change focus and try to remember what life was like before I started this website.

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Yearly Roundup: 2023 In Numbers

Welcome to 2024 – it’s a new year, so as usual (and like almost every blogger/reviewer out there) I’m taking a look back at the last year in numbers. This isn’t just a new year for me though – the end of 2023 marks 10 years of Track of Words, which is a milestone I never expected to be writing about. I’m planning on writing a couple more end of year/start of year posts soon, including a retrospective of the last 10 years, but for this article I’m going to stick with looking back at 2023 in numbers. I’m going to look at various types of numbers – two sets of site stats, in terms of articles/words written and pages viewed, a breakdown of the different kinds of posts I published in 2023, and my reading stats for the year.

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